Abbott

I don’t think the question anymore is whether Tony Abbott has lost the next election, and the Coalition will be a one term Government.

I think the question is now how many terms in opposition will they have?

The only way they might recover is a change in leader. The trouble is Hockey is equally damaged and most of the caucus hate Malcolm Turnbull (but the public love him). Could Turnbull end up Prime Minister? Let’s see how bad the polls go in the next six months.

tas

It’s incredible how much of a clusterf*** Abbott is. The only reason he managed to get elected was because the alternative was a megalomaniacal psychopath. I think he set a new record for shortest time in office before opinion polls put the opposition ahead.

Bingo99

Wow, DPF, quite off-base on this one.

Behind the hysterical reactions of the Fairfax media ($7 for a GP visit, free after ten in one year and ultimately at the discretion of the GP in the event of hardship), more level-headed commentators note that this was always going to be the nasty budget, early on in this government’s term, and that the forecasts are largely positive on the economic front, enabling for more generous budgets in the next two years. It’s amazing being a Kiwi in Oz and seeing the bleating going on at what are fairly minor reforms.

Seriously, where did everyone think the $900 freebie five years ago came from? Rudd’s ass?

But on Abbott, Aussie politics are very different to timid, dull NZ. Things can turn on a dime and it makes sense to get the hard stuff out of the way now, even though it’s pretty mild. Don’t forget the stupendously over the top paid parental leave programme that’s about to get started. Were people ever really enamored with Abbott? No. Are they in love with Shorten? No. I’d say the leadership of the ALP is the one to watch, if they smell blood from the Libs.

Farrar in his poncy wisdom offers no evidence for his weak little side swipe against Australia Government .
I have said elsewhere that this column is getting weak, and this throwaway line shows how well and truly he has lost something, some substance, some fundamental substance that was there before; drifting into political drivel and trivia, and well and truly deserves the loss of the medals of Quixote.

spanish_tudor

Abbott is being run ragged by the media and the ‘Abbott-haters’. Just as Jim Bolger was run ragged in NZ after the Mother of All Budgets in 1991 and the surtax broken promise – yet he still went on to win two more elections.

John Howard had the ‘Howard-haters’ who despised him and everything he did, yet he won four elections, including taking GST to an election and winning. Half a million people (supposedly) protested in Sydney about Howard and Australia’s involvement in the war in Iraq – yet they didn’t change a damn thing. Howard was elected next time with an increased majority.

Abbott could pull a crippled child from a burning car, and the left-wing media, students, and other useful idiots would still shriek about how much they hate him.

There’s a long way to go until the next election. Yes, there have been mis-steps, but Abbott has time on his side.

tom hunter

This is excellent news for the NZ Left wing. Get into power, permanently boost spending, and if one does lose power, let an incoming “right-wing” government deal with it via budget cuts and tax increases or new taxes.

Regain power and repeat – with all those increased or new taxes in place, courtesy of your political opponents.

thor42

He has brought the *flood* of boatpeople to a complete stop. The last boat to get to Australia was in mid-December. Remember Labor and the Greens whining that stopping the boats “couldn’t be done”?

I hope Aussies do not have short memories when their next election comes along. That “stopping the boats” success may well be one of the things that saves Abbott’s government. That and their promise to amend or remove the “hate speech” law.

edhunter

Abbott’s biggest problem (apart from himself) is that he doesn’t control the senate & while he has an absolute majority in the lower house he doesn’t stand a chance of anything meaningful being passed through the upper.
What he should have done IMO was force the issue of abolishing the carbon tax and mining tax (both election promises) as soon as he took control if the senate had blocked them he could’ve called for a double de solution of both houses & the aussie public would’ve backed him, he’d now have control of both houses & in 2 1/2 yrs time all this would’ve been but a distant memory, unfortunately as it stands Abbott is the one who will be the distant memory.
The amount of government they have here is quite ridiculous for a population of 24 million to have local, state, federal upper & lower is overkill.
Thank the spaghetti monster we only have the one house in NZ.

SJM

Abbott’s problem is that he and his government doesn’t do PR and looks like a bull in a china shop as a result. This is a bad thing when you consider that the Australian public have been treated like spoilt children for at least 15 years by politicians who have been only too happy to indulge them in the name of power. Combine this with a disturbing excess of government for the size of the population, and the vested interests and corruption that come with that, so the first government that tries to reduce the child’s sugar intake is going to have a lot of crying and tantrums in the supermarket isle.

As someone who lives in Australia, Abbott is doing the right thing, but he has failed appallingly in taking the public with him, and that is a severe fuckup in a nation that is in Australia’s position that works as Australia does.

SHG

Looking at Australia, the morons here should realise how lucky we are to have John Key as the Prime Minister and Bill English as the Deputy PM and Finance Minister….

A million times this.

I’ve never seen a party so utterly destroy the momentum of a landslide election victory. Kevin Rudd was fucking insane and the Labor Party is corrupt to the core, and all Tony Abbott and the LNP had to do to ride high in the polls was to be Not Kevin Rudd and Not the Labor Party. But no.

The overwhelming impression I get of the Abbott administration is tone-deafness. Just total obliviousness to how their policies and actions are being received by the public.

georgebolwing

Rudd, Abbott and Gillard have one thing in common: they are professional politicians who did very little in life other than be a political activist/groupie before entering Parliament.

Indeed, you probably have to go back to Chiefly to find an Australian Prime Minister with a significant pre-parliament carrier outside politics (Menzies did, however, spend 10 years as a lawyer before entering state parliament at age 34).

I think this is the root cause of the difficulty Austrlia is having. Its political leaders see their job as something akin to game of thrones, not actually governing for the benefit of the people.

Abbot has never been popular, that’s the first thing. He is really unappealing BUT there was no confidence in the alp, that’s what forced the change. Second from what I am hearing from many people is that they aren’t happy with the budget but understand that it has to be done. It’s a resigned attitude but an understanding one this is what you don’t hear on smh.com.au or news.com.au. The biggest difference between abbots and gillards broken promise is that the ALP didn’t fully disclose how had the books were. Gillards was introducing a new tax to keep themselves in power. Many people can see that the Libs have a desire and drive to get the country’s books balanced – whilst I don’t think the way they are going about is right – people aren’t stupid enough to go back to the waste that was labour. Will Abbot survive probably not, but I don’t think they will be a one term govt

tom hunter

I really do understand that staying in power so that one can actually do things is important.

But unless you can effect a change in the opposition’s policies then you face the prospect of all your good deeds turning to shit in a heartbeat.

It’s well understood that the Clark/Cullen government did not change the basic fundamentals of what the 4th labour government had done. Although they had a few ideological burps like Air New Zealand and especially the toy train set, plus ever-increasing spending, the policy setting that underpinned all that really did not change – much to the ongoing anger of the Left.

Similarly it’s pointed out that for all the squawking the current National government has not dumped interest-free student loans or Welfare For Families.

I don’t see any evidence that the ALP has had a change of approach or attitude. If they looked something like the ALP of the Hawke/Keating years then you could have some hope. But then a government like that would never have taken over the good situation left by Howard and fucked it up to the extent that Rudd and Gillard – especially Rudd – did.

Worse, they don’t appear to have learned or accepted that they did anything wrong – not even the carbon tax lie. Similarly with Green-Labour here in NZ. They’re going to be far to the left of Clark/Cullen should they gain power and I don’t think losing in 2014 will change that, especially if it’s a close loss.

And if they win this year then all bets on NZ are off. I would not be too scathing of the Aussie situation yet, nor so cocky about how we’re doing. All the levers of power the Left require are still in place.

Ross12

Totally disagree with DPF on this.
The media in Australia are further left than in NZ and have never really accepted that Rudd and co lost the election.

The Aussie economy outside of mining has not been good for sometime and Gillard’s spend up made it worse.
What is not really realised about the mining boom is that it was really a construction boom — construction of the mining infrastructure. When that is done the labour force required to run the operation is different and much smaller. Add to that Australia has priced itself out of many resource activities then the economy has a problem. Many of the big guys have shelved big projects in Australia — the construction has slowed and therefore future revenue from those projects will, at least be delayed.

Even if they replace Abbott it would not change anything –the media would just attack the new person just as much. So I think Abbott will survive and move on to be OK.

Paulus

As expected in Australia union run media are seething at any non left wing decisions, and they have the real power, which could well destroy Australia for a very long time. Goodbye the Lucky Country.
China will not come to their aid – there is tremendous corruption in the working areas and any necessary changes will be fought by the powerful unions via the media.
Similar if they could in New Zealand where the media believe they are New Zealand, and it is their views that only matter.

SHG

Harriet

“………Abbott’s popularity is slipping because of a series of broken promises.

He promised not to touch the health system…….He promised not to increase taxes…….He promised not to cut funding for education…….He promised not to reduce funding for the ABC and SBS.

Then he broke the lot.

It’s hardly surprising the voters are pissed off with him………….”

That’s not the case at all. The biggest mistake the Liberals made was how they presented the budget.

As Abbott has said “The States[the political leaders of them] have to be become more sovereign within their realm.

Major tax changes are going to be made – GST gets broadened to include all foods, education ect, and will also be increased to at least 12.5% – the States then recieve more funding for health and education via gst revenue. Income taxes can then be reduced. —– the QLD liberals don’t like it as they don’t want to go to an election next year with ‘gst being raised’ as an issue.

[Income taxes in Australia being a Federal matter were only ever a temporary measure put in place at the time of WW1 – before that they were a state matter – and have remained a federal matter ever since, and to the detriment of the States.]

simonway

The Abbott government certainly is very unpopular right now, and someone might well use that as an opportunity to stage a coup, but unless several very sympathetic, Liberal-leaning, right-wing parties in the Senate all simultaneously decide to block the budget (very unlikely imo), then Abbott has no reason to call an election until 2016. And he might not be nearly as unpopular in 2016. That’s a long time in politics.

So much ill-informed drivel almost all the so called broken promises relate to after the next election and are bound up in the “forward estimates’ a basic budget requirement designed to give a sense of probability for the states to enable a semblance of fiscal planning for their budget process.
How so many have been sucked into the socialist propaganda trap set by the unions and their controlled journos, the ALPBC and if you think Radio NZ and TVOne are infested with totally thicko socialist mouthpieces then you have not been listening.

Australia is around 5 times the population of NZ, their budget deficit is around sixty billion almost equal to our total and their total is a staggering six hundred billion at around ten fold of NZ.

Yes Hockey has proposed a levy on incomes over 160 000 as a temporary measure to reign in the deficit and proposed a contribution of $7 for a GP visit as much to bring a bit of awareness of how necessary is the visit.
that Part Pay is not applicable to high use earners and has some mechanisms for rebate in full.

FFS this is a first budget in the face of a gaping hole left by the shennanagins of infighting incompetents Krudd and Juliar Gillard and the remnants of those guilty participant MPs are now denying any problem exists.

Just as so many completely underestimated Key a similar trend exists in the West Isles. After decades when profligacy, duplication, a totally bloated Public service set up by vote buying governments “The Lucky Country” is facing problems albeit different but almost equal to those that confronted Lange and Douglas in 1984.

How nice it was that Shane Jones had the balls to invite those smart and courageous men Moore, Douglas and co to his valedectory..

The fat lady hasn’t even begun rehearsing yet inspite of the jubilant shilling of the Abbott haters and if Malcolm Turnbull is the answer it was a fucking stupid stupid question. Like dear departed Jonsie he also has been in the wrong party.

The wink is a LW media beat up, and if you’re not prepared to fight this kind of vicious propaganda then you shouldn’t be in politics.

I agree that the broken promises are the problem, but the real reason for this is that the too timid Abbot painted himself into a corner prior to the election with commitments that if he kept would make his govt ineffectual.

And so it happened.

Abbot should have said what he was going to do (provisionally) and stood for election on that.

The technique courageous politicians like Nigel Farage use.

Abbot referring to new taxes as “levies” is just pissing people right off.

coge

DPF, I think you’ve been overly influenced by the endless dirt & leftist agitprop being peddled in Australia. Abbott’s two key promises were to stop the boats (which he has done) & to axe the carbon tax (which should happen this July) Those two key commitments is what the public elected him to do.

The Australian left, is much stronger/vocal/brazen than our present domestic variety. But I won’t say they are unified. If the Abbott Govt can get a handle on their timely counter spin/ counter dirt tactics, (such as National has been using as second nature) they will get a second term & maybe more. It’s a matter of them connecting & getting their messages out quickly, well before the daily six o’clock news. A problem the Aussie left may encounter are through their own activists, some of whom have great personal ambition & little political nous. Trying to set Abbott up, as they are regularly doing, will backfire badly on them at some stage. Remember tent embassy-gate?

MH

and the windfall to NZ – we get back all the disheartend, dissillusioned, transient fly by night, greedy patriotic whingers that gave the fingers to those that stayed, because this is home. The IQ quotient affected yet again.

stephieboy

Ed Snack

Actually David you are being blinded by the vitriolic and very personal hatred that sections of the Australian media have for Abbott. That is the same side that parodied one of their journalist critics a a “dog-fucker”, nice people and right into projection, but that’s the level you are dealing with.

I think (and thought at the time) that Abbott simply made a rod for his own back by making foolish promises before the last election. Maybe he thought he had to do so to win, but foolish promises none the less. Nothing he is doing is remarkable, but the list of stupid spending that he agreed to is at the root of his problem. The Gonski education reforms (lots of money but no improvement in education of standards will result); the NDIS scheme, carefully crafted by Gillard to sound good but all the costs come in the future when someone else would be dealing with it; the parental leave scheme; and others.

None of these had to be endorsed as they were, a conditional endorsement was the so bloody obvious alternative, but I’m afraid that either Abbott was badly advised or was blind himself to the ramifications.

None of the budget changes are themselves radical or a particular issue, but they add up to a charge of breaking promises. Stupid promises, but that was a problem Abbott created for himself. However I think he may well ride it out, but fuck, why doesn’t he stand up to the shit he’s copping; are all politicians on the non-left side afraid to stand up for themselves ?

coge

The climate change social construct is huge in Australia. Although I’d estimate these days approx 50% of the Aussie public are highly sceptical of tales of scary climate change. So in their minds Julia’s ‘lie’ was based upon another lie. They voted Tony.

OECD rank 22 kiwi

Kimble

The issue is nit his policies. It is breaking their promises so flagrantly, and more what someone said being tone deaf. The wink and the cigars before the Budget.

Smoking a cigar before the budget? Dancing with his wife to the wrong song?

These are things that a biased media fixate on because they can’t fight on policy. Adults are finally in charge again, and so the lefty media is whining like a spoiled teenager. I actually saw a headline that said something along the lines of “Even Liberal supporters aren’t immune to spending cuts”, as if it was a fucking bad thing! They are surprised that the Liberals aren’t as tribal and corrupt as Labor!

There are two more budgets before election day.

As well as a Union corruption inquiry that will probably destroy Bill Shortens credibility.

SJM

Red: Nigel Farage, for all the good he has done, has no actual plan to get the UK out of the EU beyond a few comments about article 50 of the Lisbon treaty, and that’s an electoral liability. It dosent help that he is now shaping up as the UK’s version of Winston Peters, one man leading his band of one.

SJM

Redbaiter (6,598 comments) says:
May 23rd, 2014 at 4:08 pm
It does not matter what Farage’s policies are.

It is essential that the sclerotic orthodoxy of the current Progressive media/ govt bloc is shattered
_—————————————

Which means exactly nothing if the nation is governed from Brussels and not Westminster.

To shatter the”sclerotic orthodoxy of the current Progressive media/ govt bloc” the UK must be a selfgoverning nation again, and to do that there must be a viable plan to exit the EU, one that ensures continuity and stability of trade and regulatory certainty. Farage is not delivering on this point, nor is he properly countering the “sclerotic orthodoxy of the current Progressive media/ govt bloc” on what is a vapid campaign of fear,uncertainty and doubt.
And no, slogans about political correctness, smoking in pubs, and immigration dont cut it.

Bob R

@ Redbaiter,

The Cathedral has been doing its best to destroy UKIP because it obviously stands against a number of holy views about Universalism/Internationalism.

If Abbott was enacting leftist reforms the far-left Australian media would be cheering him on. The media are quite selective about what they choose to amplify or downplay. For example, the media loved to highlight any verbal miscue by George W Bush, but similar mangled sentences by Obama get ignored.

SJM

Redbaiter (6,600 comments) says:
May 23rd, 2014 at 4:39 pm
All uninteresting and off the point.

The real issue is the Conservatives, Labour and the Libdems along with the media/ academic elite tried to stop Farage with a campaign of lies and hate and smears and he defeated them.

That is what is important about Farage.
______________________________________________

Are you kidding me? What do you think the purpose of UKIP is, seriously? do you think they exist to defeat the “sclerotic orthodoxy of the current Progressive media/ govt bloc”? Or regain the freedom and Soverignty of the Uk?

One has to happen before the other Red and the clue is in the name. The mud thrown at Farage and UKIP in general is just a distraction, ffs.

CharlieBrown

I think some of the comments on here show how in denial nat supporters are. They cannot bring themselves to admit their dearly beloved john key is socialist scum and the Aussies have elected a slightly center right government that is showing they have some spine unlike our dear red leader.

Harriet

“……I think some of the comments on here show how in denial nat supporters are. They cannot bring themselves to admit their dearly beloved john key is socialist scum and the Aussies have elected a slightly center right government that is showing they have some spine unlike our dear red leader….”

The Nats have spent 8yrs defending the 47% increase in the public service that Hulun gave NZ. They haven’t reduced it.

Most of those 47% who were/are employed in the public service by Hulun are women who borrowed student loans for ‘studies degrees’ and now the taxpayer pays those university fees back by paying for the unessecery degree qualified woman to be employed by an over staffed public service.

Hulun only ever employed them so that women wouldn’t be broke with worthless degrees.

Key and English had a line by line review of departments when they first came to office – and now we have a National alighned Tax Payers union? – Clearly then National has failed at reducing wasted money.

kiwi in america

David
Far too early to draw that conclusion. Yes the messaging and PR has been shocking but honestly there’s no nice way to bring down black budgets. Rudd/Gillard left a huge mess and Abbott/Hockey are applying the British-style dramatic surgery approach. It’s starting to pay off in the UK. The Australian economy has more depth and a far broader base than NZ’s (and the UK’s). Key/English have done brilliantly in the face of the GFC, the decade of deficits and the Chch earthquakes. Abbott does not face these huge destabilizing issues. Yes China isn’t taking quite as much of Australia’s resources but pricing of the commodities markets (with the exception of coal) that Australia is rich in have held up well. Exporters there will need to be less China dependent. With fiscal fundamentals more under control, Australia has the type of economy that can bounce back very quickly.

The Australian media is more feral and brutal than the NZ media. The ABC are leading the charge with what can only be described as a concerted campaign of vilification of Abbott – the announced cuts to the ABC are causing their reporters to throw all objectivity out the window. Whilst the NZ MSM will operate the double standard, will ask harder questions of the right than the left and beat up centre right government missteps as mini scandals, the NZ media are not vicious and nasty in the way they handle John Key. In Australia, they just go for the jugular and Abbott’s team are still learning how to work in this hostile environment. Frankly its no different from doing business in Australia – its a full contact sport where foreigners (especially kiwis) need to be prepared for rough and ruthless treatment.

We own licensing rights to a transportation new technology that we are in the process of preparing for launch in Australia and New Zealand. Our Aussie partner is a bit of a low key greenie, a long time but not hard core Labor voter. He hated Gillard and Rudd and voted for Abbott (first coalition vote for a long time). He’s sanguine about the harsh budget saying it had to happen. These poll numbers are little different from the ones National faced right after the ‘mother of all budgets’ in 1991.

The coalition have shot themselves in the foot a few times and they need to seriously tidy up their messaging. Labor left the cupboard bare in a way that makes Clark and Cullen look like wise economic stewards. The burgeoning deficits in Australia were not going to come gradually under control with the English style gentler reform of public sector spending that has worked so well for National here. It’s very easy to look at National’s achievement per the 2014 budget and assume the coalition’s failure to adopt this electorally successful approach equals electoral disaster. There’s a ton of water to flow under the Aussie bridge yet.

Andronicus

quote as above
”
David
Far too early to draw that conclusion. Yes the messaging and PR has been shocking but honestly there’s no nice way to bring down black budgets. Rudd/Gillard left a huge mess and Abbott/Hockey are applying the British-style dramatic surgery approach. It’s starting to pay off in the UK. The Australian economy has more depth and a far broader base than NZ’s (and the UK’s). Key/English have done brilliantly in the face of the GFC, the decade of deficits and the Chch earthquakes. Abbott does not face these huge destabilizing issues. Yes China isn’t taking quite as much of Australia’s resources but pricing of the commodities markets (with the exception of coal) that Australia is rich in have held up well. Exporters there will need to be less China dependent. With fiscal fundamentals more under control, Australia has the type of economy that can bounce back very quickly.

The Australian media is more feral and brutal than the NZ media. The ABC are leading the charge with what can only be described as a concerted campaign of vilification of Abbott – the announced cuts to the ABC are causing their reporters to throw all objectivity out the window. Whilst the NZ MSM will operate the double standard, will ask harder questions of the right than the left and beat up centre right government missteps as mini scandals, the NZ media are not vicious and nasty in the way they handle John Key. In Australia, they just go for the jugular and Abbott’s team are still learning how to work in this hostile environment. Frankly its no different from doing business in Australia – its a full contact sport where foreigners (especially kiwis) need to be prepared for rough and ruthless treatment.

We own licensing rights to a transportation new technology that we are in the process of preparing for launch in Australia and New Zealand. Our Aussie partner is a bit of a low key greenie, a long time but not hard core Labor voter. He hated Gillard and Rudd and voted for Abbott (first coalition vote for a long time). He’s sanguine about the harsh budget saying it had to happen. These poll numbers are little different from the ones National faced right after the ‘mother of all budgets’ in 1991.

The coalition have shot themselves in the foot a few times and they need to seriously tidy up their messaging. Labor left the cupboard bare in a way that makes Clark and Cullen look like wise economic stewards. The burgeoning deficits in Australia were not going to come gradually under control with the English style gentler reform of public sector spending that has worked so well for National here. It’s very easy to look at National’s achievement per the 2014 budget and assume the coalition’s failure to adopt this electorally successful approach equals electoral disaster. There’s a ton of water to flow under the Aussie bridge yet. ”

Abbott was largely the beneficiary of a string of fortunate consecutive long-term ALP state incumbency fatigue results which resulted in the illusion that he was a satisfactory Liberal leader and prime ministerial material. As it was, remember his original leadership election result was a close-run thing, with only a single vote separating him from Turnbull. I suspect that one major trigger behind any ensuing Liberal caucus party room coup to dislodge him in favour of Turnbull will be this- Victoria’s state elections in November 2014. As you can see from the polling, the Napthine administration will probably lose it. Given that Victoria is one of Australia’s largest states, if the loss is heavy, then the turkeys won’t wait for Christmas to vote…

Shazzadude

I expect this term will be much like the last when Rudd came in-Abbott and Hockey will carry out their agenda until months out from the election and will be replaced by Turnbull solely for the campaign to try and save as many seats as possible.

Adolf Fiinkensein

David, are you suffering from too long a period with insufficient oxygen? This post of yours, two and a half years from the next scheduled election, is not what I’d expect from a person steeped in politics.

Perhaps you have not noticced that Labor, the Greens, Fairfax, ABC et al all seem to think Abbot lost the last election. They have mounted a barrage of anti Abbot publicity ever since. Why? They fear the loss of the senate if there is a double dissolution.

All_on_Red

Abbott needs to do what Gillard failed to do. That is, front up and admit he has had to go back on his word, and explain he had no choice.
Ironically, he hasn’t reduced spending at all but merely refocused it.
And all the commentators above who describe the bias in the Oz media against the Coalition are absolutely correct. Our media are pussy cats compared to the outright vicious and nasty lot over there. The lying and twisting of the truth is just outrageous.

All_on_Red

“David, are you suffering from too long a period with insufficient oxygen? This post of yours, two and a half years from the next scheduled election, is not what I’d expect from a person steeped in politics.”

The prog / Helen Clark/ John Key faction of National may be starting to feel the heat Adolf.

Key’s fatuous need to be popular taking precedence over the need to lead may at last be drawing criticism from those within the party who think it should stand for something.

I have a much better idea. As New Zealand’s leading centre-right blogger, how about working out how a Turnbull-led Coalition Government would differ significantly from the current Abbott administration? I’ve made the same suggestion to NBR’s Neville Gibson.